[Box Backup] License

[Ben Summers]

I think I'm tending towards a BSD license. Maybe with enlarging the 
advertising clause to request a link to the web site?

As you point out, another good argument for it is that if people start 
using it, at least they're going to be using mine rather than another 
system. Which gives me opportunities that I wouldn't have otherwise.

Ben



On 29 Feb 2004, at 03:40, Pascal Lalonde wrote:

>
> Of course I'd prefer it to be under a BSD license. Where I work
> my superiors would be glad to use BoxBackup to backup our customer's
> data. The thing is, we are not a large company, and we need to get
> something out of it to be able to maintain the extra servers.
> Our big customers don't really need it, since they have well 
> established
> backup procedures with tape drives (still, I wouldn't be surprised to
> discover a certain lack of discipline). But smaller offices have poor,
> or almost non-existent backup procedures, can't afford it, and we
> can't afford going there each week with portable harddrives to take a
> snapshot of their data.
>
> If your program gets adopted by larger companies, maybe you'll get
> funding to add features, port it to other platforms, make it more
> stable, more scalable, whatever.
>
> Like you say, putting it under a BSD license would certainly reassure a
> lot of people, and you would get a lot more users. A lot of bugs will 
> be
> discovered and fixed, and maybe people will try test its security to 
> find
> flaws in the design. The product will surely benefit from this.
> Just an advice though: be sure to add more comprehensive error 
> reporting
> before you do this, because your mailbox will be flooded from user's
> questions ;-)
>
> On the downside, you lose the exclusivity. But those who had the idea 
> of
> charging for backups will probably turn to other ideas, like rsync over
> SSH, even if it's not quite the same. So in the end, I don't think you
> would gain much more by leaving the license as it is.
>
> It may seem like I'm just waiting for you to put it under a BSD license
> so we can get rich by charging for backups, but I'm not really that
> type. And the price must be under what it costs for tape drives and
> cartriges. And using BoxBackup means the customer needs a reasonable
> bandwidth, and preferably no upload quota (my ISP charges an extra 30$
> CAN to remove the 5Gb limit, and raise the upload rate from 360Kbits to
> 640Kbits). The monthly fee would have to be quite low, because most
> customers are quick on x12 multiplications. I'm not a finance expert,
> but I don't think much profit could be made by charging for backups,
> unless one has many, many customers.
>
> So yes, I'd like BoxBackup to be put under a BSD license, but remember
> that BoxBackup is yours, and that you are free to do as you will.
> That's my opinion.
>
> Pascal Lalonde
>
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